Sisters! Organise don’t Agonise!
Women strikers in Dagenham 1968
Left Unity Women don’t want much, says Felicity Dowling- useful work, equality at work, a living wage, a working week leaving time for ourselves, family, fun and culture. We want affordable homes, health care free at the point of need, universal education, care for the elderly, good pensions, decent benefits for those who can’t work, freedom from violence and oppression, a safe, green environment, peace internationally and in our communities, fair representation in government and the running of our organisations.
The bare bones of this were built by the 1945 post-war settlement, and since then by women in struggle: like the equal pay fight of Ford women in the 70s, Doreen Lawrence fighting for race justice and in the fight for abortion rights. This progress is being looted by this government.
This country can afford a decent life for all! The government say we are all in it together; like hell we are!
There’s nothing you can do about it? Oh yes there is!
They tried that line on the suffragettes. They said that women couldn’t be doctors, control our own fertility, have equal pay or maternity leave. Did we listen? Should we listen now?
Organise don’t agonise. We need a mass movement, a political voice for women in favour of a decent welfare state and against cuts. We must build again the traditions that won us rights in the past. Organising with others helps keep us safe and sane as we fight for a worthwhile future, without the greed and austerity of capitalism.
Austerity is only for the working class, not for the rich. We live in the seventh or eighth richest country in the world. The very rich get steadily richer: income inequality is increasing. The income of the richest tenth of the population is greater than the bottom five tenths combined; inequality greatest in 30 years. The rich take the cash and don’t pay their fair share of tax. The income of the richest thousand individuals, after the crisis in 2008, increased by 25% in 2009 and 20% in 2010. Even a small part of wealth of the richest 100 people in society could pay for the basics of a decent life for all. Capitalism has plenty more crises stored up for us – the environmental crisis possibly even bigger.
In Communities women are often responsible for protecting the community aspects of life. For the rich to get richer; then women must be marginalised and thrown back into traditional gender roles.
Public sector cuts hit women hardest, but everyone suffers – 75% of cuts have yet to come. Two thirds of the public sector workforce is female. This work is essential; without it the care for the young, the old, the sick, those with disabilities falls back onto women at home. Women are a majority working in the NHS, in schools, social services, the civil services, local government, in care for the elderly.
Politicians talking of balancing the books know nothing compared to the task women do in their homes, managing to produce a semblance of civilised life for families on next to nothing. Life without basic rights is a struggle in which the weakest suffer. Real incomes have fallen for more than three years.
Women’s unemployment is at a 26 year high. Employers make more profit by paying low wages. Women and children are significantly more likely to be poor than men. Nearly 50% of part time workers have low incomes. Poverty of children is inextricably linked to the income of their mothers. Women with unemployed partners are six times more likely to die as a result of complications during pregnancy or childbirth.
Across the world women are the poorest in the community, doing more than their fair share of work. An absolute majority of industrial workers across the world are now women! In Vietnam two weeks ago striking women were attacked by police. In Bangladesh, terrible working conditions killed more than 1000 young women as one shoddily built factory collapsed. In Pakistan 300 women were killed in a factory fire – their families still await DNA proof of their death. Working women are beginning to show their steel and build unions and women’s organisations. Left Unity women want to work in solidarity with women in struggle around the world.
“… a perfect storm of spiralling living costs, lack of decent, secure jobs and benefit changes are making it impossible for many people to feed themselves or their families” (Oxfam). Women’s wealth is shared with their children; one in four of UK children face childhood poverty. Families including 126,000 children used (official) food banks last year. As work dries up, one unexpected event can spell disaster. Pay rises are not matching inflation, heating and water bills, transport and other basic costs keep rising. Women’s pension age is rising yet young women can’t get started in work. Those who make a living, work long hours.
The UK, the world’s seventh richest country, home to some of its richest people, ranked 23 in the status of women and mothers. Save the Children reports we have higher maternal and infant mortality rates than much of Europe. Child care is ridiculously expensive. Hundreds of sure start centres are closed or operating on a shoe string.
The roll call of women killed by their partners grows by at least two per week; the tip of the iceberg of violence against women. Grooming, abuse (physical and sexual), present problems for women, girls, some young boys and the decent men sickened by it. The media present a distorted picture of women’s lives, distorting sexuality. Violence against women is both cause and consequence of inequality and deep seated negative attitudes to women.
It is just plain wrong! Women can see that this “perfect storm” is immoral, hurt by it or not they are getting organised. The establishment told the suffragettes they could not have the vote. Did the women listen? Should we listen now? Women in the Unions are using industrial action to make a stand. The women who built Labour will be turning in their graves to see Labour leave the poorest unprotected; but their granddaughters will stand in their tradition, not that of New Labour.
Left Unity women invite women into a historic campaign for a decent life for all. We don’t disguise the difficulties. We will be taking on the weight of the establishment, it won’t be easy; it will take real strength. We need a better world – and a better world is possible.
6 comments
6 responses to “Sisters! Organise don’t Agonise!”
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Felicity, on 22 May you wrote – in response to a series of criticisms of your “Surveying the damage” piece: “This is a very short response.i will do a more complete one soon.” You didn’t.
Very similar problems occur with your contribution here, in brief: is there a good reason for you to repeat that same old boring formula used in much left ‘debate’, telling us the stuff we know already and never get to what should be the point – how we overcome our almost complete inability to persuade most people in “our working class communities” to agree with us, join our campaigns, vote for us, etc.?
Your piece here leaves us none-the-wiser but this is unsurprising, as you come from a tradition on the left that blames everyone else but yourself or your comrades for our present problems and past defeats. Your tradition also ignores a feminist and anti-racist (to name but two) critique of left political theory and practice.
The recent relaunch of an updated edition of “Beyond the Fragments” is instructive for Left Unity and, although I and others would not be uncritical of its conclusions or the theory, practice and current prescriptions of its authors, it is far ahead of your empty rhetoric. One of its main conclusions: why is it still necessary to address very similar concerns more than 30 years on, is a depressing underlining of how bad the situation is and how far we have to travel.
I sincerely hope that Left Unity does not become yet another part of the problem, but unless the politics of Felicity’s and similar pieces are challenged and overcome in the development of LU, we will be condemned to repeat the same mistakes for the next 30 years; and will be partly responsible for the suffering that follows.
Felicity what a wonderful piece of writing . It’s clear, it’s to the point and is something we can all use in debating with friends, family , work colleagues, on the streets, etc… I hope this is used in any literature put out by Left Unity in the future. I will be using it in Doncaster. In fact it is stuff we talk about all the time in Doncaster and that includes the male campaigners too. I think Left Unity should lead with this type of politics, passionate. I think your article speaks to all those women who work in the public sector, who provide 70% of it’s services, who are well aware that if the welfare state is demolished these jobs will still be done by them for free. Women lose in every way, their financial independence, their confidence, status, home, future… the list is endless. Your argument is at the heart of austerity world wide.
Well done In drawing so many issues together succinctly. Although all has been said before in different ways I think for a new organisation it is good to see all the basics outlined so we can the develop or get involved in campaigns around different aspects. We know it is not always easy to get women from various communities to get active just because we know there is need for change.
However We can never tell which issue will spark the biggest response. However we do know that women and men do move into mass activity when thoe spark hits home. We saw it with the miners strike, the Poll Tax and various anti cuts campaigns. In our area often the biggest movements have been around parks, swimming pools and other leisure facilities. But as we saw in Liverpol in the 80s with a council prepared to stand up for what it believed in and go out and educate and campaign the support was there.
Future movements may well be different in style or focus but we know from looking around the world that people are not prepared to accept all that capitalism throws at the,. As you say let’s get organised so we can be involved in similar movements in the UK
Thank you Louise and Margaret for your comments. I hope we can work together to build the women’s struggle As Margaret said we can’t tell which issue will set sail but we do know there is anger and a wish to change things.
I’m writing to now to reply to Ben.
Ben, you, a man, accuse me, a woman, of ignoring a feminist perspective! You accuse me of empty rhetoric of boring formulas? “Your piece here leaves us none-the-wiser but this is unsurprising” You then casually dismiss the writings in “Beyond the Fragments “as somehow not meeting your standards “although I and others would not be uncritical of its conclusions or the theory, practice and current prescriptions of its authors”
What do you hope to gain from such insults? Do you want to shut me up or do you want to humiliate me or what? I demand the right to be heard without insult, unless I am racist sexist or in some other way oppressive!
It is imperative that we have safe and welcoming spaces, on line, or in meetings, and socially where women feel safe to speak, safe to contribute without insult or hectoring. This is non-negotiable, Ben. I was elected to the steering committee on just that platform. I find your insults especially troubling because I did stand on the safe spaces platform.
I’ve been around in the Labour and Trade Union Movement too long not to stand up for myself and my sisters. Left Unity should not be a place where that is required. Every woman (and man and those who reject those categories) should feel safe to make her point unless she is being racist sexist or otherwise oppressive.
I want all our daughters, sisters, mothers, grandmothers to feel they are welcome to take a full part in our movement. You mention mistakes in the left in the past. Well let’s make the oppression of women one thing that’s not repeated in, or acceptable in, Left Unity.
Leaving that key issue for now I want to also address the point you make when you say the main issue is
“how we overcome our almost complete inability to persuade most people in “our working class communities” to agree with us, join our campaigns, vote for us, etc.?”
Well speak for yourself, Ben. I have not had that problem neither in the 80s nor now. I could list the meetings, indoors and outdoors, I have participated in. At that these events the ideas in this article have had great responses.
On the “Vote for us” bit of your criticism, I’m not, personally, convinced that the electoral role is one we should give all our focus. I’d rather see us building a movement of self-help and solidarity, one that raises the idea that another world is possible, that gives people the chance to meet discuss and work together. On that basis we could build an effective electoral platform but we might not have the time to do that. There could well be communities or neighbourhoods were we can win elections. There’s nothing wrong with standing and losing whilst we build our movement.
In Greece if Syriza had not been there at that time of crisis, although they then had only a tiny initial support, them the situation for working people, the unemployed, carers, farmers, immigrants the elderly and the very young would have been even worse. That the phenomenal organisation of resistance in Greece has given the rest of the European working class a half chance to fight back.
We can build left unity based on mutual respect and tolerance, debating issues whilst being kind, caring and respectful to each other.
A final point Ben, you commented negatively on this article that I had not replied in a sufficiently timely manner.
“No cause can be won between dinner and tea, and most of us who were married had to work with one hand tied behind us. (Hannah Mitchell, The Hard Way Up).
Women do not want their political power to enable them to boast that they are on equal terms with the men. They want to use it for the same purpose as men – to get better conditions. (Selina Cooper – 1906 from Wigan Observer)
I’m a woman, a worker, a career, and an activist. I’ll reply just as soon as I can and I’m not going to be quiet because I can’t meet someone else’s deadlines.
I repeat the offer I made on the reply to your other criticism that if you do actually want to discuss some of these issues, then you are welcome to contact me.
Thanks for the article Felicity. In organising as women or other oppressed groups we find collective strength which makes it much more likely we can effectively understand and challenge the oppressive behaviour which acts to keep us out than we can as isolated individuals. Thats why I think we need caucuses inside Left Unity as well as safe spaces policy and articles like this.
Ben your comments are extraordinary. Did you read Felcity’s article? How dare you suggest she cant be/isnt self critical. Her piece may leave you none the wiser but that wasnt my experience – it left me feeling empowered, part of a conversation – so dont claim to speak for me. As the disability movement says – nothing about us without us.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR ARTICLE, FACING SIMILAR ISSUES HERE IN LEFT UNITY GLASGOW AND SCOTLAND WITH GIVING WOMEN A VOICE AND A CHOICE X